“Effective on February 29, 2012, I will be resigning my position as CEO of the North Pole. My age is beginning to get the better of me, and I am no longer able to deal with the stress of the numerous responsibilities and intense media scrutiny. It has been a good long run, and I thank those of you who supported me and helped make this possible. I now am looking forward to enjoying my remaining years in quiet retirement with my wife.”

Reactions to the news of Claus’s retirement have been mixed but very passionate on both sides of the discussion. The history of the man and the famous North Pole Corporation is a long and mysterious one. His unwillingness to speak to the media has resulted in very little knowledge about the early years of his life, but experts and scholars who have studied him tend to agree that he was born in Greece almost two thousand years ago. It is commonly believed that he then traveled to Germany, which is where he learned the art of crafting toys from wood. He studied the trade there for a few centuries before traveling to the Netherlands, where he took a job building toys at a small shop to support himself.

Finally, in the late eighteenth century Claus took the money he had saved and immigrated to the United States. Upon his arrival, he used his savings as capital to establish his own toy manufacturing company. Starting with only three elves, the company rapidly grew and began to offer delivery services as well. Claus’s reputation as a jolly, good-natured man is largely due to his early years personally delivering toys in a reindeer drawn sled (although he rarely makes the deliveries himself anymore). From these modest beginnings, Claus’s corporation has expanded dramatically, and today it employs over 250,000 workers and manufactures over twenty million toys a year in more than two hundred countries.

Yet despite his impressive success, Claus is probably best known for redefining Christmas into what we know it as today. The holiday was originally intended to be a celebration of the birth of the Messiah Jesus Christ, but as time went on people began to treat the day as a serious occasion of reverence and church-going. Claus had always felt that this message was a depressing one, particularly for young children. So on the night before Christmas in 1809, he loaded up a large red sleigh and delivered free toys to the children of every house on Earth. The joy he created was so great that Christmas became a day of celebration once again. So Claus vowed to repeat this act of charity every Christmas, and has held true to his word, causing him to be beloved by children all over the world.

However, Claus’s generosity and joviality have not endeared him to everyone. Many prominent Christian groups have criticized him

Desperate Claus turns tricks for cash.

for “destroying the sanctity of Christmas” by removing Jesus from the equation. Anti-consumers have attacked him for the “commercialization of the holiday season.” Claus has also faced a stream of legal troubles over the years. In 1934 the United States Department of Labor conducted an in-depth investigation of the North Pole Corporation based on allegations that the elves were being subjected to excessively long hours and cruel and harsh working conditions (a settlement was eventually reached, although the terms remain a mystery). In 1985 PETA sued Claus, claiming that his “use of reindeer as slaves for transportation, even after the invention of modern methods such as the car, was inhumane and disgusting.” Yet somehow Claus dodged this bullet as well. The reindeer were brought up again in 1993 when the Federal Aviation Administration convicted Claus of numerous air traffic violations over the years, resulting in over $2.5 million in fines. And while there has never been any significant evidence to prove it, there has been much speculation that Claus has been using Christmas as a way to augment his wealth through involvement in immoral and illegal activities such as panhandling outside Walgreens and fraudulent online shopping websites that take advantage of the dynamic of the holiday season to fleece the general public.

Whether you love Santa Claus or hate him, it is impossible to ignore the impact that his departure will have. Will his successor continue the Christmas traditions that he has become so well known for? Claus announced that he will most likely look for an outside hire to fill his shoes, and he was quoted as saying that the most important things for any candidates to have are “a rotund belly, a jolly demeanor, and a fondness for red suits.” Rumor has it that Kevin James, Drew Carey, and Zach Galifianikis are all being considered for the job. The official announcement will be made on February 28, Claus’s final day.

– Marius Berner

Photos by Dan Cronin^

You may have been told that the phenomena we know today as rap music began in the late 1970’s. Unfortunately, somewhere along

2,012,000 B.C.

Putac, a barbarous cave dweller, accidentally burns himself during the invention of fire and let’s loose a 15-minute, non-stop burst of primitive curse words. He will ever be known as “the Grandfather of Rap.”

32 B.C.

The promising rap career of Flavour Flavius is cut short when he is forced into early retirement due to a massive neck strain caused by wearing a concrete sundial.

1 A.D.

Jesus is sentenced to crucifixion after changing his name to Jay-C, and constantly dissin’ on Caesar’s crew.

1201 A.D.

During the Byzantine Empire, 13 defendants are assassinated in a series of Crusades, but not before touring as “Chrystians With Problems” in seven European countries.

1498 A.D.

Leonardo da Vinci abandons his painting and inventing, devoting all his energy to his rap career. The move pays off, as the Renaissance rapper enjoys great success under his stage name, Italian Ice.

1517 A.D.

Angered by the indulgences against rap music, Martin Luther nails his 99 Problems to the church’s door.

1536 A.D.

The Notorious K.I.N.G. aka Henry VIII continues the pimping game after beheading his fifth wife, subsequently coining the phrase “Bitches ain’t shit.”

1601 A.D.

William Shakespeare becomes so inspired by the ongoing rap sensation, he scraps his current play Romeo and Juliet, and writes a beautiful story about true love found between opposing gangs, the Crips and the Bloods. 

1905 A.D.

After changing his name from Albert Einstein to Al B. Smart, Al develops his famous Theory of Relativity. This theory states that once you become a rap success, all your leech relatives will hit you up for money.

1917 A.D.

Lil Franz Ferdinand is gunned down on the Vegas strip. No one saw anything.

1939 A.D.

War breaks out. It’s all rap music’s fault.

– VanillaBearr

One conquistador named Cortés (known as virtually the only historical figure in English history books to get an accent mark in his name) ended up in Mexico. The non-lethal Aztecs who had just finished viciously conquering the area thought the Spaniards were gods. Cortés encouraged the rumor, presumably after hitting his head on a rock and thus forgetting that he was in Mexico to spread Catholicism and get rid of the Aztec gods.

Mexico was renamed “New Spain” because the Spaniards were really creative, coming right out of the Renaissance. The Spanish crown created the encomienda system which blah blah blah printing press blah blah blah. The Indians got screwed (somehow) and Spain claimed a lot of the New World.

Realizing they hadn’t appeared in the text since the fur trader episode,

The French Claim Canada

The French started establishing colonies and spreading Catholicism in Canada. Unlike in the rest of America though, the Native Americans and French got along pretty well. This proves the idea that, regardless of the circumstance, it is physically impossible for anything violent to happen in Canada.

Figuring that everyone else was doing it,

The English Enter the Competition

King Henry got sick of his wife, leading to a set of domino-like cause-and-effects, eventually resulting in the Protestant Reformation. After his death, the Catholic Queen Mary ruled England and killed a heck of a lot of Protestants.

Historians came up with a complex explanation for the slaughter that went something like this:

One night at an all European sleepover…

SPAIN: If you say “Bloody Mary” three times while looking in a mirror, she’ll come out and kill you.

CATHOLICS: No way.

SPAIN: Then do it. I dare you.

*Catholics go over to the mirror…*

Eventually, Queen Elizabeth came into power.

FEMINISTS: Yay!

Spain got annoyed at England and took its very hardcore Armada fleet out to destroy the country. The fleet was destroyed by a storm, preventing what would have been one bloody battle. England was sticking its tongue out at Spain and ready to start conquering.

Irish Rehearsal for American Settlement, a.k.a. We finally find out how violent a group has to be for textbook writers to consider them lethal

England took over Ireland. It was very, very brutal. Women and children killed… all around, pretty bad. So bad, in fact, that I can’t really make a joke out of it, which leads us to…

An Unpromising Beginning: Mystery at Roanoke

According to the text book, the English went forward and made every mistake possible. Since the book did not go into detail, we can only assume that they bumbled around Siberia, fell for Internet scams and were probably the real cause of Global Warming.

A guy named Sir Walter Raleigh founded a colony in Virginia. Sir Richard Grenville led the expedition. Long story short, Grenville actually sailed back to England, leaving the colonists behind.

GRENVILLE: So, uh… You guys seem pretty adjusted to this enemy ridden wilderness.

COLONISTS: You better not be thinking what I think you’re—

GRENVILLE: So long, losers!

A year later, Francis Drake happened to pass by the colony after a cruise. The colonists quite literally climbed aboard his ship and went back to England. Raleigh started another colony. This one was led by a painter. Raleigh’s logic for putting a painter in charge of his colony was, “Hey, it can’t go any worse than the first one.”

Much to his embarrassment, he lost this colony. His friends begged him to try and remember the last place he saw it, but Raleigh shrugged it off and figured that hey, at least he got a paragraph in the history books. He then pursued a life of obscurity.

NATIVE AMERICANS: Well, that’s probably the last we’ll see of the English.

- Ilana Strauss

Photo by natamagat

The Late 1400′s Around the Globe: Same Old

“Indians” and Europeans started trading.

FRENCH TRADER: I’ll trade you twenty knives for the enslavement of some of your people.

INDIAN: …

FRENCH TRADER: Twenty knives for taking your land and forcing you to live on reservations?

INDIAN: …

FRENCH TRADER:  I’ll throw in a few malaria-ridden blankets if we can stamp out your religion.

INDIAN: I’ll give you a beaver pelt.

FRENCH TRADER: Deal!

INDIAN: And you won’t do any of that other stuff, right?

FRENCH TRADER: Right.

West Africa: Ancient and Complex Societies

West Africa had ancient and complex societies.

Trade in Africa

PORTUGUESE TRADER: I’ll trade you twenty knives for the enslavement of some of your people.

AFRICAN LEADER: All right. *They shake hands*. This is a great day for Africans everywhere. No one will ever wish I hadn’t made this trade.

PORTUGUESE TRADER: I’m sure glad slave-trade raises absolutely no ethical issues.

Europe about to Conquer Places

Europeans really wanted to go to the West because Classical writers said that the Atlantis and Greek heavens were supposed to be there. Europeans also believed in using leeches to cure people of a vile, disease-causing substance known as “blood.” The phrase “Don’t believe everything you hear,” had not been around then. Though, if it had been, they doubtlessly would have believed that too.

Vikings sailed to America, set up settlements, and left. No one noticed.

The Middle Ages happened in Europe. There were a lot of plagues.  It was, presumably, bad. Then the Renaissance materialized, leaving people to scratch their heads and wonder what happened to the Middle Ages, which were just called the “Ages” back then. King Henry the Eighth reminded everyone of the good old violent days by cutting off his wives’ heads. Isabella and Ferdinand married and become monarchs of Spain.

ISABEL: Let’s drive the Jews and Muslims out of Spain!

JEWS: Oh, yeah. We can totally afford to be kicked out of another country. That’s fair.

MUSLIMS: It is so unfair that we Jews and Muslims are picked on all the time.

JEWS: I agree. Let’s be friends forever!

MUSLIMS: Pinky Swear!  *They hug*.

The printing press was invented in the 1440s by Johann Gutenberg, sparking a communications revolution blah blah blah.

- Ilana Strauss

Flickr photo by Hans Splinter

PALEO-INDIANS: Hey, here’s a brilliant idea! Let’s walk across a giant snowy land bridge to reach a continent that we don’t even know exists!

Eight thousand years and a heck of a lot of frozen Paleo-Indians later…

PALEO-INDIANS: Oh, no! Global warming is killing off the woolly mammoths. After all, their being dead must have nothing to do with the fact that we’ve been slaughtering and eating them for eight thousand years. We’d better start an agricultural revolution and grow vegetables.

VEGETABLES: …Crap.

Native America started making tons of impressive cities, presumably to attract European tourists. Ironically, the Anasazis “mysteriously” disappeared just before the Europeans arrived. Yep. The Europeans just missed them. A total coincidence. No potential mass murder here…

According to the textbooks, the Aztecs, “an aggressive, warlike people,” conquered a bunch of cities and “ruled by force.” The book goes on to say that “before the arrival of white settlers, Indian wars were seldom very lethal,” leading us all to wonder how violent a group has to be for the textbook writers to consider them lethal.

A few years later, Columbus attempted to sail off of the edge of the world, but being the incompetent sailor that he was, missed and ended up in the Bahamas. He called the natives “Indians,” paving the way for the complication of political correctness everywhere.

- Ilana Stauss

Flickr photo by Michael McCarty